In Your Memory
by Brindabella
Summary: Alex looks back at his history with Amy and remembers the times when everything went smoothly as well as the times when their dreams fell apart. A soppy fic about Alex's grief, his time with Amy, and lots and lots of maddening fluff along the way! R&R pls
1. Falling at your feet

Date began: February 5, 2007

Date finished:

Dedication: For myself, cos when you all begged me for an AlexAmy fic, I wrote it just because you requested it. I thought I could never get into it, and now I am hooked and can't stop writing them.

Disclaimer: None of the characters belong to the writer. They remain property of Channel 7 and Southern Star.

Song credits: The Veronica's, Stevie Wonder, Wendy Matthews, Ben Folds, Leonardo's Bride, Peter Gabriel, Simply Red, The Whitlams, Andrea Bocelli, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Lamb, Guy Sebastian, Crowded House, Tim McGraw, Mariah Carey, Evanescence

Warning: Don't hold your breath for each chapter of this fic. As you can see I've been working on and off on it for more than a year now. I've been pretty slack and a lot of the time I've lacked motivation and ideas for this story. But more will come as soon as I can manage it - Brinds

**In Your Memory**

Chapter 1 Falling at your Feet

_I know I look like a total dag, and sound like one too, but what the hell. What they see is what they get with Alex Kirby. This is just another posting…woah. Who is this? I turn expectantly to Jonesy, giving him the look._

"_Well hello Foxy!" Ohhh she's cute. I look her up and down, as much as I can, since she's sitting behind a desk._

"_Senior Detective will be fine." _

_Hmmm great start boofhead._

_Falling head over heels_

_Thought I knew how it feels_

They won't let me in…I need to be in there to hold her hand. She needs me. She's in there by herself. What if something goes wrong? I pace the corridor anxiously, oblivious to all around me. Not that there's much going on – it's the middle of the night. But I just want to be with her.

"_Don't tell me you're nervous Amy Fox!" I tease her as we drive in the afternoon sun._

_She goes to defend herself, but then stops, just admitting the truth for once. "Of course I am Alex," she replies, giving a little laugh. I reach over and squeeze her hand._

"_Don't be," I assure her quickly. "If I love you, they'll love you."_

_She nodded, still looking a little afraid, and sat back in her seat to stew over it for the rest of the ride. It was me who had suggested we do the whole introduction thing, because I know, even though we have only been together for a few months, that this is the woman I'm going to marry._

_As we get closer to my parents house I wonder if she knows it too. I wonder if she feels as infatuated as I do, and thinks we'll get married as well. I wonder what she will think of the rest of the Kirby's. My brain doesn't stop turning over until we pull into that familiar driveway – the driveway where I rode my first bike, threw up 15 beers with Jonesy and reversed Dad's car into the letterbox. It's home. _

I pull at the handbrake and go to climb out of my seat when Amy grabs my hand desperately. I turn to her, my face questioning. Being home feels so good for me, a part of me wonders why it feels so nerve wracking for her.

"Are they seriously going to like me Alex?" she asks me again. Never before have I seen this hardened detective so unsure of her own abilities. Her eyes seek an answer from me, one that will reassure her.

"Amy," I begin, unable to stop myself from smiling in the face of her nerves. "My parents are just like me. If you get on with me, you'll get on with them." I lean over to kiss her and she receives the kiss absent mindedly. "Don't worry."

We climb out of the car and I am almost glad in a way that I will never have to meet her parents. Because I'm sure I'd feel exactly the same as she does right now and I'm not as brave as she is. I take her hand and we walk up to the house. I lead her around to the backdoor. My mother always says that only salespeople and people we don't like come to the front door. Our friends always use the backdoor. So that's where I take Amy. She's still nervous, and grips my hand tightly. I smile at her as I push my way inside, letting the screen door slam behind us. This house is always open, and that's what I love about it.

A head pokes out of the living room, a jumble of pens and paper in her hand. It's my mother, and of course, she heard us the moment we pulled up but couldn't tear herself away from her next best seller.

"Alexxxxx," she greets me in her usual tone, the way that makes me glad to be home. It's like old friends greeting each other. Barrelling me over in a hug, my hand comes apart from Amy's and I sense her step away and hang back. So I break out of Mum's hug and step back to Amy, lacing my fingers through hers and gesturing with my other hand to Mum. "Mum? This is Amy." I almost blurt out my real feelings – "Mum – this is the love of my life" – but I know she'll slap me one for embarrassing Amy so much. So I keep it simple. But nothing could ever stop a meeting the parents moment being awkward, for anybody.

Amy extends her hand to my mother, which of course goes ignored and gets squashed as she hugs my girl to death. It's the Kirby way. 

_  
"You wouldn't believe how much Alex chatters on about you on the phone to me Amy," Mum smiles warmly at her, and I watch as Amy's shoulders lower and the worry lines disappear from her face. My mother can put anybody at ease. _

"Really?" she asks, squeezing my hand.

Mum nods and bustles into the kitchen. "Oh only every minute of our conversations!"

Amy turns to me as we follow her and grins so big and so unlike herself that I am taken aback for a moment. She brings her hand up to my cheek and pulls me in to kiss her as we walk – it's a secret, meaningful moment that overrides my embarrassment at being shamed by my own mother. As we enter the kitchen we keep our hands linked, our fingers laced through each others, and I know this afternoon and dinner tonight will go just fine.

"_I like her." Dad nods at me, smiling and raising his eyebrows in my direction. _

"_Do you now?" I ask, taking the piss out of him all I can._

"_She from work is she?" Dad ignores my pathetic attempts at beating him in the humour stakes. I nod, looking through the loungeroom door and into the kitchen where my mother and my girlfriend stand talking. "Ranked higher than you?"_

"_Sadly yes," I laugh. "She's a D Dad." It makes him look into the kitchen too and study her in a different way now that he knows she has brains and not just beauty._

"_How long have you two been…?" he lets the end of the sentence hang in the air until I answer._

"_Half a year?"_

"_All going good?"_

"_Yep."_

"_No problems…here? There?" He's skating around it very well._

"_She's the one Dad." I know she is. And with that he eases himself out of the chair, walks over to me and shakes my hand firmer than he ever has before. It's a sign. I grin, knowing he will be the first to hand me a beer when I tell him we're engaged._

_He wonders out of the room and into the backyard, all set to water the veggie patch in the setting sunlight. I sit alone for a moment, just lapping up the incredibly happy way I feel right now. I can hear the girls still chatting in the kitchen, and I realise how easily Amy has slipped into this mould. Over dinner the four of us talked like we were old friends, and I saw a side to Amy – a social, talkative, welcoming Amy – that I had never seen before. It makes me wonder what the rest of our lives will be like._

_I ease myself out of my chair the same way Dad did, and shove my hands in my pockets as I approach the kitchen. The closer I get the more I can hear their conversation. As I step onto the tiles of the kitchen floor Amy finishes her sentence with an unsure smile at my mother. "…hasn't asked me yet."_

_I know immediately what she is referring to and my heart almost leaps out of my chest with the confirmation at last that she wants to marry me too. I grin and step over to the two of them, wrapping my arms around Amy front on, and the two of us turn our heads to my mother as they abruptly end their conversation. Mum whacks me with the tea towel as she bustles out of the kitchen and to the back yard to give Dad his before bed cup of tea. She whispers quickly in my ear, just loud enough for me to hear. "Next time you bring Amy to visit Alex Kirby, she better have a ring on her finger!"_

The doctor comes out with that look on his face that I've only seen in my nightmares. But no matter how much I close my eyes now he won't go away. I brace myself, the tears already forming in my eyes. "I'm sorry Mr Kirby," he said quietly, extending a hand to pat my shoulder uselessly. "We always knew that this was a risk when Amy became pregnant."

I nod numbly, the tears spilling over my cheeks in a steady cascade of pain. I don't even know what to say. I knew it was a risk too. But I had always counted on Amy being the strong person I knew her as. The doctor doesn't seem to know what to do either. "Come down to the nursery when you're ready…" he says quickly before again taking to the long corridor.

How can I go and see our baby? She will be her mother in every sense of the word, and how can I look at that when I don't have her mother anymore? I fumble my way out a side exit and into a small upper level courtyard at the back of the hospital. Yelling obscenities at the world my heart hurts and I wonder why we ever agreed to have children. This wasn't supposed to be the way things went. I've gained one, but lost another.

I hang over the railing and cry so hard I lose my breath. The tears fall silently down to the bushes below as I squeeze my eyes shut and gasp for breath, wrapping my arms around myself, only making me realise I'll never be able to hold her again – the way I used to every single night, the way I did our wedding night, and the night she told me she was pregnant. I'll never have that again. It's gone.

_I can't believe I'm going to ask. I can't believe we've got to this…finally. I sit her down on the couch and place myself down next to her, trying to contain her fidgets. One weekend away from the office and you can barely hold her down. She itches to be back there – a holiday is not something she's used to. Although, she is a lot better than she used to be. _

"_How long has it been Amy?" I whisper into her ear as she finally settles into my arms and ceases her fidgeting. She knows what I am referring to immediately – it has been a long time now, and I know she can read my mind._

"_Three years," she whispers, turning around to smile at me as she answers my question. She touches my cheek with the back of her index finger and I notice for the first time the beauty that surrounds her slender hands. Now I can only add to that._

_I slide off the couch, taking her by surprise as she struggles to sit upright. My 32 year old knees moan and groan at my actions, but just the look on her face makes me forget any pain. She knows what I'm about to do. She's caught on. I dig, fumbling, in my pocket. It's in there somewhere!_

_Finally I find it and open it, holding it out in front of her. "Will you marry me?"_

_I feel like this is the beginning,  
Though I've loved you for a million years,  
And if I thought our love was ending,  
I'd find myself drowning in my own tears_


	2. Tahlia

Chapter 2 Tahlia

"Alex?" I turn around at the voice in the semi darkness. Jonesy stands there with tears staining his cheeks too. But at least he can speak. "Go and see your little girl," he whispers, walking closer to me. "Go and see her. Go and hold onto her." He looks at me with shattered eyes and a down turned mouth. She was my soulmate, but she was his best mate. I take his advice.

I don't know how I find the nursery. I don't know where it is in this hospital. But eventually I reach it and there is the doctor, leaning over his desk, lit up only by a dim lamp. He looks up when he hears me enter, and with the same look on his face as before, he leads me over to one of the bassinets that sits quietly within the small room.

We both look at her for a moment, sleeping soundly, the picture of beauty. My first child. My only child. My child with Amy. "Her name's Tahlia," I whisper to the doctor beside me. "Tahlia Amy Kirby." It's the only name that would ever seem right. He nods, understanding, and leaves me to be with her.

Delicately I slip my hands underneath her head and her back and lift her out of the bassinet, propping her against my chest. Instantly I smell her scent – a soft, new, gentle little smell that I've never had the pleasure of smelling before. Sitting down in the armchair by the window I watch as she sleeps in my arms, content, snuggled and safe, but without the person she needs the most. My tears stain her pink blanket, but she doesn't stir.

Hey there's not a cloud in sight

It's as blue as your blue goodbye

And I thought that it would rain

The day you went away

_I extend my hand to her, and she glides out of her seat the way she has been gliding around all afternoon. She's walking on air, just like I am. I pull her close and even though our friends and family clap and cheer I almost can't __hear them. She seems dwarfed in front of me, our fingers intertwined and our foreheads almost touching. She closes her eyes for a moment and I take the opportunity to breathe in her scent – the essence of everything about her that I fell in love with that first day in the CI office. The way her skin always smells like fresh rain, and her hair like a bundle of sweet roses. At night those smells help me to fall asleep, and in the morning I wake up to them right by my side for yet another day. _

_We sway in the middle of the dimly lit dance floor, and I feel like we're the only two people on this earth. The bottom of her dress swishes swiftly from side to side and brushes my ankles occasionally as we take our first dance together. No words come out of her mouth, and none come out of mine. There seems to be nothing left to say. We both mouth the words to the song we picked out months ago. It is our song, and a tear slips down her cheek as she sings it softly with me, so close that I can feel her warm breath on my chin._

_Where was I before the day that I first saw your lovely face?_

_Now I see it everyday_

_And I know_

_That I am _

_I am_

_I am…the luckiest_

I look down at the wiggling infant in my arms who sleeps in exactly the same way her mother does. Did. She's gone. I need to keep reminding myself of that. Only now is it really beginning to hurt inside. It hurts so much that I ease myself painstakingly back up to standing and place Tahlia back down on the sheets that make up her bassinet here. She doesn't wake as she settles back into the small space and I lean my hands on the plastic edging as I try to control my gulps for air that struggle with my tears.

_I feel like we're in that awkward spot my father spoke of just before the wedding. The time after the honeymoon, but before you've settled into a life together as a married couple. I've been trying to tell her all day – tell her how much I love her – to make this awkward feeling go away, but I just haven't had the chance. And now I walk through the door by myself, it's 6pm, and I still haven't bloody told her._

_I flop down on the couch and try to shake off the feeling of emptiness our house contains. I wish she didn't have to stay back at work today. As I think this, my phone rings with the ring tone I always love to hear. It's one of the songs Nick Barker sings on the movie 'Amy'. And it means that my Amy is calling. I smile and dig eagerly into my pocket to retrieve my phone._

"_Hey babe," I answer, loving that she lets me call her that at last. It wasn't always that way._

"_Hi," she answers quietly in reply. She rushes on. "Can you meet me?"_

_I'm confused. "I thought you were working?"_

"_I'm not feeling well…" she stutters, still quiet. _

_The slightest thing and I'm worried, but I don't show it, because I know that's not what she wants. "Sure babe…where?"_

"_The coffee shop around the corner." It's settled. We hang up and I head straight back out the door._

_I walk up to her quickly and she does the same and we meet each other eagerly on the street corner. The sun is just starting to go down, leaving a bright yellowy orange glow across everything, including us. I assume we will go and have a coffee, and then I can tell her what I've been meaning to for the last two days, but she doesn't move from the spot where she stands on the pavement and I look at her, curious. She kisses me hungrily on the mouth – hard and loving and never something she has really done in public before – and then laces her fingers through mine and leads me down the street for a few metres before I settle into a steady walking rhythm beside her._

_She stands close to me, our shoulders touching. She seems nervous. Not as nervous as me though. So it doesn't come out like I wanted it to. "I'm glad you're not working…" I whisper to her as we walk, a smile curling onto my lips. It just tumbles out. "I love you even more today than I did yesterday." I smile, but it's not returned._

"_Alex I think I'm pregnant." _

_What?_

_She stops and lets go of my hand, right there in the middle of the street, taking me by surprise. Not that I thought we would just keep on walking after she said something like that, but still._

"_Really?" I seem happier about this than she does, and she's known longer than me. But knowing Amy, she's spent that whole day agonising over it._

_She nods and we continue walking. When we finally get back to the station where our cars are parked her demeanour's changed. I can see it in her eyes how badly she wants this. The way she grips my hand with such strength, and never takes her eyes away from looking at mine as we stand leaning against my car. The way she won't move for fear I might disagree with her and how she ignores the ringing of her mobile in her pocket. _

_You leave me speechless_

_When you talk to me_

_You leave me breathless_

_The way you look at me_

_As if I would ever say no to this. The grin can't be wiped off my face. "Amy!" I laugh, my feet almost not touching the ground. I squeeze her hand right back, and then cup her face in my hands for a kiss – the same kind of kiss she gave me on the corner before._

_She smiles too, just a small smile and then goes to speak. "I don't know for sure yet Alex…" she stares at the ground. "I might not be."_

_I know she's stressed. She doesn't feel well. She's worried. I envelope her into my chest and hold her. "Don't worry babe," I try to soothe her. "Wait and see."_

_Wait and see. Wait and see. I'm dying here! Just quietly, I think she is – she's looked like death for a week now. Not her usual self. Something's different about her. But I don't say anything. Every night since that day at the coffee shop she's slept really close to me, and I've just been waiting._

_I've only just opened my eyes. She's all fuzzy. And very awake. I sit up quickly, but she pulls me back down and we lay in amongst the sheets, facing each other. _

"_I am."_


	3. Clouds in My Eyes

Chapter 3 Clouds in my Eyes

We always knew our risks. I was surprised that we even got that far to be honest. But like everything with us, it popped up out of the blue and took us by surprise. But we never approached it with any sense of dread – only excitement. Our heads were probably too clouded with fluffy visions of a happy little family that would grow like they do in movies. I still worried, and I know she did too, but we were too excited.

That's why I am coming crashing down right now, at midnight, in this unfamiliar sterile place where 14 sleeping infants all belong to beaming new parents. Except for mine. She only has a parent. Not _parents_. How will I do it? How can I possibly bring her up? Without Amy? Amy did all the hard work. She threw up her guts for four and a half months, stayed in bed for the final two months and put up with all the aches and pains. And now she will never get to enjoy the best part.

I fall asleep in the armchair a little later, and as I drift off it feels like she's still sleeping beside me. The way she always has. The way she was always supposed to.

I love you

Even when I'm sleeping

When I close my eyes

You're everywhere

_Mornings seem to be the toughest for her. Wake up, throw up, brush teeth, throw up, get dressed, throw up, try to eat, throw up, drive to work, throw up. She is hiding it very well, being her usual stubborn self and doing what she needs to do, wiping her face and just getting back to work. We've been lucky so far in that no one has had the chance to notice._

_This morning we walk in together, our hands linked and as happens almost every morning, she rushes to the bathroom waving me away with her hand. "I'll be out in a minute." She doesn't like me to fuss over her. She's pregnant, not dying she says. So I have to go and sit at my desk and listen to her groaning in the bathroom._

_I shuffle my papers and rattle my pens in their jar so I can't hear her throwing up so much. The station is so quiet. We make a point of getting here early, so no one else is around. _

"_Alex!" It's Susie. Hmm I guess we're not always the first ones here. She has a cup of coffee in her hand and is making a definitive beeline for my desk. I look up and smile at her. "Is that Amy in the bathroom?" she asks, narrowing her eyes._

"_Yeah it is," I reply, not sure what else to say._

"_She's pregnant isn't she?" _

_Can all women read minds?_

_Amy emerges a few minutes later, her skin pale and clammy, and her whole body radiating exhaustion. "I'm fine," she whispers as she passes my desk. Maybe this is what all pregnancies are like. How should I know? I watch her as she enters her office and closes the door. She still looks pale, and I can tell even through the partially closed blinds. But I know she doesn't want a fuss made. I don't want her to be stressed. I turn back to my work, doling out morning duties for the troops. _

_As I am calling out Joss and Kelly's patrol route, I hear Amy retch. I snap my head around to look through her office window and see her doubled over, her head in the bin. I can't help it. I run into the office._

"_Amy," I mutter, crouching beside the bin and putting my hand on her shoulder. She looks up at me with watery eyes, a rank sweet smell radiating from her clammy body, itself exhausted from so much vomiting. She gives me a death stare, so unlike herself, and I spring up from my position on the floor and reach over and close the blinds, not letting any of our colleagues see Amy at her weakest. _

"_It disappears after the third month right?" I ask._

At dawn Jonesy is back. I knew he would be, somewhere in the back of my mind, but I hadn't thought about it. I can't seem to move out of the armchair by the window. New Mums and Dads come and go, visiting their new bundles of joy. Some of them notice me, others try to tactfully steer clear. They know who I am. I'm the father of that baby who needs to be bottle fed because her mother died during childbirth. Who slept soundly her first night but now can't stop screaming. I don't know what to do with her. Or myself. I'm not cut out for this.

He stops at the nurses station just inside the door and speaks with the midwife there, tilting his head towards hers as they whisper about me. She nods and smiles and pats his arm before sending him over to where I sit, my clothes rumpled and ugly dark rings marking the space under my tired eyes.

He walks right past Tahlia, giving a brief glance inside the bassinet. Maybe she reminds him all too much of Amy too. That's most of the reason I can't look at her. He saunters over to me, hands dug deep into his pockets, a frown etching his forehead and stands in front of me. He kicks at my shoe as if nothing has happened. As if I haven't just become a single parent. As if I haven't just lost my wife. I look up at him in disgust.

"Have you held her yet?" he asks quietly, sitting himself down beside me.

I nod numbly in response, my throat too choked up still to make an audible answer.

"Has she been crying like this for long?"

Again, a nod is all I can manage.

No fight left or so it seems

I am a man whose dreams have all deserted

"Alex." He's starting to mumble. He looks at me and shrugs his shoulders, his eyes glassy and beginning to overflow as he sits beside me. "I'm really sorry mate…" And with that we grip each other in a tight hug and I hold onto him desperately, because I know I'll never have anything else to grip on to again.

"_We're going to need you to come in a bit more often than we would recommend other expectant mothers do," the doctor says a little uneasily. I feel Amy's grip tighten around my hand. I lean forward in my chair._

"_Why? Is something wrong?" I ask in such a way that demands an answer – the same way Amy's grip on my hand demands an answer._

_The doctor smiles, but he still looks uneasy somewhat. "No. We just need to take some extra precautions with this pregnancy that's all. Amy's past medical history means that her pregnancy will need careful monitoring, just in case."_

_I feel Amy flinch in the seat beside me. "Just in case of what?" I ask._

"_Just in case," he smiles again, and gets up from his chair. "Make an appointment at the desk for next week as you leave."_


	4. Numb

Chapter 4 Numb

I said no to a police funeral. God knows Amy deserved one. More than anyone that has ever served, Amy deserved one. But I couldn't let them do it.

I don't know what to do with myself. I don't want to go home because with every corner that I turn there will be something that reminds me of her. Her toothbrush by the bathroom sink. Her clothes in the closet. Her sunglasses on the hall table. And then other little things that before now I would never have noticed – the way the shower smells like her shampoo, and the piece of paper with a list of baby names on it that has floated to the floor after falling off the bedside table.

And even though I can't seem to bond at all with her, I don't feel like I can leave my little girl here though. If I left she would be all alone in this hospital without me. She's already without Amy. How could I do that to her? So I stay, and I wonder listlessly around the hospital grounds, going back every half an hour to see how she is going and if she has stopped crying. Everytime I return there is a nurse with her – trying to soothe her, trying to feed her, trying to get her to sleep. She doesn't like it. I don't blame her.

A nurse takes me aside. "Mr Kirby?" she seems timid, like I might just bite her head off. I must look like I would. "We have already arranged for a community nurse to visit you when you take Tahlia home…" she hesitates. "…but there is no pressure to take her home before you're ready." She says it like she thinks in the back of her mind that maybe I won't take Tahlia home. Is that the façade I am showing off to everyone? Is that the vibe I'm giving out? I suddenly shudder at the thought.

I push past her and burst out into the hallway, gasping for breath the way I did on the balcony less than 24 hours earlier. Suddenly it seems like a dream. Has this really happened? Because I would never have questioned whether or not I would take my daughter home before. So it must be a dream. I haven't lost Amy. She's just down the hall. Jonesy is there too, with his camera ready to take our picture.

I turn left and head that way, towards Amy. Without really seeing Jonesy I fall into him. "Mate!" he sounds surprised. "Where are you going?" My best friend.

"Where's your camera?" I ask him blankly.

He frowns at me. "What?"

As soon as that one word leaves his mouth I know it's not a dream. What a plummet back to earth. "I can't go and see her can I?" It's a stupid question I ask, but I can't help myself. I can't accept it.

His face softens in front of me. We have always been able to read each others minds, even to this dreadful day. "Do you really want to?" he asks softly, an arm around my shoulder.

I nod even though I know it will be the hardest thing I've ever done, and usually I would avoid something like that. But I didn't even get the chance to say goodbye. Jonesy leads me to the mortuary.

They've been expecting me. It's weird, because I wasn't expecting to come. But they lead me straight inside – no time for hesitation or reflection. So it smacks me in the face the moment I step into the tiny room. I almost fall over from the force. She lies there. I can't even look. What if she's lost the beauty I fell in love with? The sparkle that made me smile? The fire that drove her insides? The passion that made her the light of my life? I can't look at her.

So I sit in the corner of the room.

A lover's promise never came with a maybe

"_Amy?" I ask it with hesitation. It must be obvious because she stops what she is doing and looks at me with a fear in her eyes that she refuses to acknowledge out loud._

"_Don't even think it Alex." She walks away from me, into the other room._

_I sigh. But I have to accept it. If she can accept that this comes with risks then I should be able to too._

The door opens. I don't know how long I've been sitting here. Maybe it's kick out time. But the warm smile the nurse wears indicates otherwise. "She just looks like she's sleeping. Don't be afraid." She says it so soothingly I almost want to take her up on the offer. But I don't move until she leaves the room.

Only when she is out of the room, down the hallway and out of sight do I scuttle my chair over to my life's bedside. I hesitate to touch her, knowing she will be chilled and lifeless. But the magnet between us is still so strong, even in death, that I find my hand gripping hers only moments later. It's shattering that she doesn't squeeze my hand back in return, and it makes me place her fingers delicately back onto her chest seconds later. Even though the hand is the same shape it has always been, with the same lines and curves, it doesn't feel like Amy, because she doesn't squeeze back.

I remember back to how we fell into each others lives that day. That day I made a fool of myself and she maintained so easily her cool persona. The day I got my first glimpse of her – the woman who would change my ways and steal everything about me to keep as her own. I remember the day we got married and the last day I had with her. The memories of that last day are shady and dark though, because even though we knew the risks, oh we knew the risks, and we silently reminded ourselves of them everyday, I still never thought that that would be my last day with her. It wasn't going to happen to us.

We stumble into each other's lives and we knock some things over

Standing up, I lean over her and don't do anything to stop myself from picking her up in my arms and holding her against me. It feels horrid to have her against my chest again, but I hold her anyway and cry into her shoulder. She hangs limp against me of course – I knew that would be how it would feel – but I didn't anticipate how her hands would flop by her sides, batting at my hip bones without meaning. Or the way her cheek would sit jaggedly on my shoulder as if I were just rocking her to sleep in the middle of the night. It's the most awful feeling I've ever felt, to have a dead body against me, but I can't seem to let go. Because when I do that will officially be the end. I will never see her again. I will never hold her again. She'll be gone for good. And I can't live without her.

But after a while I can no longer kid myself. I'm not really rocking her to sleep. I'm sending her off to the angels that tap lightly on my shoulder incessantly, telling me to let her go. So I place her reluctantly back on the trolley, cradling her head delicately with my hands before I lay it back down to rest. So still. Never the way she should've gone.

That nurse is right. She does look like she is sleeping. Thank God. I couldn't handle any other look on her pretty face. But still, will this moment be how I remember her? No longer walking down the hallway with a smile curling onto her lips to greet me but on a trolley in a hospital with the life sucked out of her? I can't look at it any longer. Closing my eyes I bend down and place my lips on hers and only kiss her with a feather light touch so that her chill doesn't penetrate me anymore than it already has.

The stars will never shine the same

I walk back out into the hall to where Jonesy waits. It's 9 o'clock and he looks as tired and hagged as I feel. He stands up and walks with me back to the nursery, remaining a respectful distance from my side because he knows that's where Amy stands, walking beside me.

Amy did it because I wanted us to have a baby so badly. She did it for me. And for that I will never forgive myself.

Tomorrow I will take Tahlia home, and the following day we will farewell her mother.

I'll always keep the light on for you

_Samantha. Cassandra. Rebecca. Bree. Sophie. Elise. _

_I write the names down on the list I've stuck to my desk. It's pretty long now. _


	5. Stumbling

Chapter 5 Stumbling

The nurse put her to sleep, but she's gone now, and I'm going to have to be the one who picks her up when she wakes. I feel apprehensive. I will never be as good at this as Amy would've been.

I don't wonder around the house because everything I see reminds me of her. It makes me want to close my eyes and never open them ever again. The marks she left before we went to the hospital two days ago still remain over everything. The bed smells of her – a scent I will probably never be able to get out of the sheets. Not that I would want to. Her favourite coffee mug sits dirty on the sink and I don't wash it. The books she devoured during those final two months sit stacked on the dresser, the corners of the pages turned over. Her library card sits delicately on top of the stack. I wonder if they will notice if I never return them? We always thought we would just return them after the birth. We always thought that this was all going to work out. We never let ourselves question the risks. She'd told me not to even think it. So I didn't.

Your sadness, a thief, waits in the hallway

I look around me. We decorated this room together, before the bedridden stage happened. A little bit of pink, a little bit of blue, but mostly pink. She knew it would be a girl. It's a complete room. We were ready and waiting to be parents. Now I am anything but.

Pregnancy mellowed her, once she got over her fears about actually having a baby. She would sit in this armchair and rest her hands on her belly and stare out the window. Sometimes she would even whisper to our little girl. It was storybook stuff. I would watch her from the door and smile and try not to get too excited about what would happen after nine months. It wasn't easy.

I wonder away, out of the room, as she continues to sleep. I pad to our room and pick up the large framed picture of Amy that sits on my side of the bed. It always embarrassed her, but it gave me everything I never knew I needed. Her beauty still radiates out of the photograph which relieves me. At least that hasn't gone. I carry the frame back to the nursery.

Placing it on Tahlia's bedside table, I look down at her sleeping in the wicker bassinet. I knew I wouldn't be wrong. She is the picture of Amy, even in the way she turns her head in slumber. In some strange way, it brings me comfort. This little creature will forever be a pleasant reminder of the woman I loved with everything I had.

Sometimes you're asleep I whisper "I love you"

In the moonlight at your door

As I walk away I hear you say

"Daddy, love you more."

I lie on the floor and wait for her to wake as the dim light from the lamp by the photo spreads a glow around. It almost feels like we're all together again. Me on the floor, Amy at the bedside and Tahlia in the bassinet. So I don't move. I just wait so that I can be right here when she opens her eyes and I can see more of my Amy that I know will be there.

I'll always keep the light on for you

Everyone is in black. It's such a dreadful colour. Would she have wanted everyone to be dressed like this? I don't know. For the millionth time I remember that we never thought it would come to this. I know she never let herself think about a day such as this.

We hover outside the church, me and my little girl, and a crowd of my colleagues surround me, trying to think of something to say. I wish they would just realise that there's nothing left to say. Nothing will make a difference. So we just stand as Tahlia sleeps in the pram that I have covered over lightly with a sheet. It stops everyone from looking at her and crying even more than they already are.

They don't hug me, because I know I'm distinctly giving off the vibe of not wanting to be hugged. A few people get them in anyway, like Susie, who squeezes me so tight I nearly lose my grip on the prams handle for a moment. I jerk out of her embrace and place two steady hands on the handle. She pulls away, upset but understanding. We walk into the church a somber bunch.

As I sit in the pew at the front and feel everybody trundle in behind me, just as somber as my colleagues and I, I look over at the minister. How does he do this job? I have a new respect for him. And as the service begins I tune out what he is saying, not wanting to hear his words of loss and grief. I already have enough of my own.

I still hold onto the prams handle as I sit, and beside me I feel Jonesy's eyes boring holes in the side of my face as I keep my eyes focused on the picture of Amy that adorns the first page of the leaflet someone handed me earlier. As if I would want a momento to keep of this day. What were they thinking when they gave it to me? But I still hold it as tightly as I do Tahlia's pram handle.

I look up just in time to see the minister look over at me. This is my cue. Last night, when I laid on the floor, I couldn't picture myself getting up and addressing everyone at my wife's funeral, but I somehow manage to get up today. And I know I take everyone by surprise when I peel the sheet that covers Tahlia's pram off and drop it on the pew where I had been sitting just moments before. Bending down to pick her up she doesn't stir. In a way I am grateful. I wish I was sleeping through all of this too.

She fits so well into the crook of my elbow, such a tiny little ball of soft skin and perfect fingers, and I take her up to the front of the church with me, not knowing what on earth I am going to say.

When I get up there I can't look at the people, only at her. She begins to wake and when she opens her eyes and looks at me for a moment the first tear slips down my cheek. I turn her around and prop her tiny back against my chest so that the whole crowd who have come here today can see her beautiful Amy eyes. "This is all that Amy wanted. It was all _I _ever wanted with her…" my voice begins to wobble, and I can do nothing to stop it. "I don't know what I did to be so lucky as to have these two people in my life but whatever it was, I will never regret it for a single moment." I bring Tahlia back down to be in my arms again and place my first kiss on her forehead. "She was everything to me…" I'm mumbling now. "…just, everything." I reach an awful realisation. "I will be nothing without her."

Everybody rises as five men who played parts in Amy's life approach the stand where her casket sits. Jonesy, PJ, Brendan, Tom and Bill wait until I place our daughter back in her pram and surrender her to Susie. I walk numbly up to them, we bend down together and as one lift the wooden mound onto our shoulders as her favourite Crowded House song begins to play softly.

There is freedom within

There is freedom without

Try to catch the deluge in a paper cup

There's a battle ahead

Many battles are lost

But you'll never see the end of the road while you're travelling with me

Hey now hey now

Don't dream it's over

Hey now hey now

When the world comes in

They come, they come

To build a wall between us

We know they won't win

We stand around the site and I feel like the clouds are going to swallow us all up. In my nightmares, the same nightmares where the doctor came to reveal to me terrible news on my wife, the day of the funeral was just like this. It was always how I'd pictured it. It doesn't rain though, and I think everyone is relieved in some way. Even though it doesn't seem possible, rain could only make this day worse than it already is.

I thought that it would rain

The day you went away

It means too that I can keep my little girl in my arms. It's when she is there that I feel closest to Amy, and perhaps Tahlia feels closest to her there too. Whichever, I'm not going to hide her away.

We farewell her with some quiet prayers and a few roses that are buried with her and soon make our way back to the sanctuary of the cars parked by the cemetery entrance. By keeping my words to myself most of the day, I have been able to hear what they all say about me. They've planned a wake, but I won't be going. They can toast my golden girl all they like, and celebrate her life with as many bottles of alcohol as they like, and cry into their tissues as much as they like, but I'll be doing my grieving in private. It's the way Amy and I were. But nobody seems to understand, least of all my closest friends.

I pray you'll be our eyes, and watch us where we go  
And help us to be wise in times when we don't know  
Let this be our prayer, when we lose our way  
Lead us to the place, guide us with your grace  
To a place where we'll be safe

"Come Alex," Jonesy pleads with me on the way back home. "We can look after Tahlia...let's just be together." His tone has wavered all day, from when he first greeted me at the gate of the house Amy and I once shared to when he said a few words about her at the service to right now in the back seat of the car, a sleeping baby creating a barrier between us. I understand how much he misses her, but I can't understand how he can't quite understand that all I want is to be alone. With others I feel like my Amy gets lost in the crowd. And I can't have that.

"No," I shake my head, looking back out the window as I say it. Now rain is falling, streaming down the window like tears from up above. It makes a lump form in my throat. Everything reminds me of her and how she's gone. "I can't." It's the truth at least. I really can't. Because I couldn't promise I could keep my composure around all those mourners.

As the car comes to a halt outside my empty house, I pop the buckles off the carry seat that my daughter lies in sleepily and gather the handles in my shaking hands. As I step out of the car, covering Tahlia with my jacket so that she doesn't get rained on, I turn back to Jonesy and soften for just a brief moment. "But have a drink for me will you…for her." No amount of drinks will ever be enough. He nods and watches as I walk through the front gate and up the walk.

As I approach the front door, grateful to be in the cover of the verandah roof, a car door slams behind me and I turn around, surprised anyone would brave the pelting rain. Susie runs up to me and jumps onto the verandah awkwardly in her high heels. They, like the rest of her outfit, are a mournful black, a colour which I am beginning to hate. But I try my best to look at her face as she speaks to me.

The tears are still in her eyes, even now, even after the funeral is well over. "I know how it feels Alex," she says quietly, dropping her eyes to the ground as she squeezes my free hand. "I know you feel like you'll be nothing without her…but it won't be that bad. You won't be nothing." She smiles a kind smile and I know there are so many things I don't know about this woman. She leans down and strokes my daughters cheek with the back of her finger before walking down the verandah steps and back down the walk to where Jonesy waits for her in the car.

I don't know if she's right or not. Maybe. But probably not. I was nothing before I met Amy, and I will be nothing again now that I have lost her.

I pray you'll be all right

_I cup her cheek in my hand as we lie facing each other, our legs intertwined, our bodies close, our fingers laced together resting on the pillow. It's the first quiet moment we have had to spend together in ages and I shiver at how good it feels. Only now are we processing everything that has suddenly popped up in our lives. And I don't want to avoid the though questions, even though I know she does. So I kiss her softly before breaking the ice and beginning a conversation I know she doesn't want to have. A situation she refuses to let herself believe._

_She can tell I'm thinking it. But for some reason asks anyway, perhaps in hope that I won't bring it up. "What's bothering you?"_

"_I'm worried Amy," I reply, a frown creasing my forehead. In the dark everything seems more serious and scary, like we can't escape it. "I didn't think…" I choke on my words. "I didn't think you would be at risk. I thought everything would be ok."_

"_It will be ok Alex," she reassures me. Her face however, says the opposite. A tear slips down her cheek as she looks at me. "I'm worried too. But…I didn't realise until recently that more than anything, I want this baby. I want it with you. Whatever it takes." She manages a smile through her tears and it gives me some strength somewhere deep inside. Amy is the strongest person I have ever known._

"_Amy…" I can't help but smile at her in the darkness, inspired by that strength. "Tell me what you want for her." Somehow I know it's going to be a girl too, and I put my hand on her belly and her eyes fall downcast watching it._

"_I don't want anything for her, except for you to always be by her side." _

_Another tear slips down her cheek as she closes her eyes and settles unconvincingly into sleep._

_Safe in your soul_

_Bathed in your size_

It feels great to fall into bed after such a day. I haven't done much of anything, yet still I feel unbelievably drained. A new baby in the house doesn't help things I suppose. If Amy were here we could've managed it together just fine.

"_Can we really do this?" she asks me, her voice barely above a whisper as we walk back to the car where it waits in the shade of the trees of the hospital carpark. I squeeze her hand at my side and smile into her eyes. Anyone could look into her eyes a thousand times and still never see what I do. _

_At risk of sounding cheesy I hesitate for a moment, but then say it anyway. "We can do anything together babe." _

_She squeezes my hand back and smiles, and as we walk back to the car I see that first hint of a new motherly glow in her cheeks._

I curl up in our bed, now so torturously empty and face the window so that I don't have to face her side. Every night we would face each other and sleep close that way, what was going on outside our bedroom windows not even getting a second thought. And now, this room has been emptied of her presence and I feel it engulf me as I try to get used to the feeling of a world without her.

Come into my sleep

Come into my sleep, oh yeah

Dry your eyes and do not weep

Come into my sleep

_Only when the morning sickness stops and her bump starts to grow does she let herself become excited, although she tries not to show it. I lay beside her, my head propped up on my elbow, and watch her as she sleeps peacefully. There was no pre dawn rush to the bathroom this morning, and there hasn't been for the last week and a half now. Maybe that's over. _

_She stirs, pleasantly, not with a jolt like she did in the first few months, and looks into my eyes before looking at anything else. I grin my widest grin at seeing her looking so alive and radiant this morning, rather than the exhausted wife I had got used to seeing. It makes me lean over and kiss her hard on the lips in a morning greeting, and she comes out of it grinning as well._

_Content in the morning sun we roll onto our backs against the pillows and she shuffles over to rest beside me, her head against my shoulder. As we stare at the ceiling I see out of the corner of my eye her hand glide over her stomach. She turns to me, giddy and unable to stay still. "It kicked during the night," she reveals._

_I feel sad at missing the moment. "Yeah?" I ask, keeping a normal façade as best I can manage._

_She nods happily. "I got your hand, and held it there, but you didn't wake up."_

"_Really?" I ask in wonder. I don't remember her grabbing my hand – I didn't feel it, I obviously didn't wake - but it still feels like I have felt our baby kick. My heart rushes with love. She nods back at me before climbing gracefully out of bed, one hand slipped under her belly and the other under turned supporting her back. I watch her as she walks to the en suite and marvel at how, overnight, she has changed from just a woman to a pregnant woman. I lay back and mentally file away the image of her this way in the back of my head as I soak up the morning sunlight that streams through the window._

"_Hey Alex," she calls me minutes later from the bathroom. I am happily at her beck and call, and so gladly slide out of bed and pad to the bathroom where I find her standing, side on, in front of the mirror. As I stand in the doorway, she looks at herself in the mirror, able to see so well the extent of her pregnancy. She turns to me with a smile so radiant I am almost knocked over from the force. "It's bigger today." She gushes and whispers, so in awe of the person she has become. _

_I step over to her in our tiny en suite and wrap my arms around her from the back, letting my hands rest on the beloved bump. I nestle my chin into her collarbone and she rests her head on mine, still smiling that smile. "I really look pregnant now don't I?"_


	6. You and Me

Chapter 6 You and Me

Chapter 6 You and Me

My friends know me so well that they know that on the night after Amy's funeral, when they were all toasting her life with a good dose of something strong, I was lying in bed unable to sleep, because I am inundated with text messages and voicemails all night long. It's kind of them, and it's not until the morning breaks that I realise I do want to be close to them now that she is gone.

So I am grateful when at 7am on the nose, Susie knocks at the door. I am barely able to let her in as I juggle Tay – a nickname I feel so suits her simple sweetness – a blanket, a nappy and my self confidence. Like the day before, Susie doesn't hesitate to give me a squeeze, despite the fact my hands are full, just as they were yesterday when she tried. But this time I let her…for some reason.

She says hello and all the usual greetings as we go to sit on the couch in the living room, but once we're actually seated, a thick silence drops into the space between us. Neither of us knows what to say, so we just don't speak, instead watching Tay as she slumbers lightly in my arms. She lies in the crook of my right elbow, the one that is against the back of the couch, and with my spare hand I suddenly rub at my eyes and drag my hand down my face in tiredness. I haven't shaved since the day we went to the hospital and I try with my hand to just wipe away everything that makes my face looks so dreadful.

Susie smiles sadly in my direction then, sympathy lacing her features. "Go make yourself some coffee mate," she advises me kindly. I suppose it could help, so I get up and head towards the kitchen just as she steps in front of me, blocking my path. I stare at her, still unable to say anything. "Give yourself a rest Alex," she urges, slipping her hands underneath mine and lifting my baby into her own arms before settling back onto the couch, her back to me as I walk to the kitchen, eying Amy's dirty unwashed mug as I enter.

As I make the coffee, I feel like the weight is still in my arms and against my chest, and I frown as I feel it refuse to shift. It makes me realise something I should've realised from day one.

Numbly I walk back to Susie and place our drinks on the coffee table. Sitting down the opposite end of the couch from her, I watch as she coos and whispers to my daughter. She strokes her soft hands and cheeks and smiles lovingly down at her, so engrossed and enchanted.

I spring my question on her immediately, hoping she will reply swiftly. She does. "What am I supposed to do Suse?" I ask pathetically.

Her head snaps up immediately and all of a sudden all her attention is entirely on me. I stare back at her, my eyes question marks. "You're gonna find some way of managing this," she says determinedly.

"How?" I press on. "I'm not cut out for this."

"Of course you're not," she replies. "But who is?"

My head drops and I stare at the pattern on the cushion. "Amy would've been," I mumble.

"Amy could do anything Alex, you know that," she smiles at the thought. "None of us are as strong as she was."

A tear slips off my eyelash, quickly followed by several more. "I miss her so much," I blubber embarrassingly. "I can't even get out of bed Suse." I admit the horrible truth through gritted teeth to my friend as the sun comes up.

She nods as if understanding and shuffles to be right beside me. Her legs together, she places Tay on her lap and holds her with one hand as she holds me with another. I howl into her shoulder for half an hour as she says encouraging and sympathetic words that I don't hear. Because nothing will help.

After Susie leaves I force myself to sit at the kitchen table and sort out Amy's things. Not her material things – her pyjamas, her handbag, her perfume…those are things I will probably never move from their place in our home – but her bank accounts, her shares, her finances, and her assets. Her bank account has to be closed, and the money moved from there into an account for when Tahlia is older. Amy wanted her to achieve great things, so the money will be for a private school or her university education, if that's where she decides to go.

The registration on her car must be cancelled and the insurance paid out and finished with. The shares she owned must be sold, and I must decide on a way to receive her police legacy payment. I have to pay the hospital, and the funeral people. There is so much to do, but most of me doesn't want to even touch it, because, just like washing her dirty coffee mug, it will be like erasing a little bit more of my Amy.

So when Tay cries, I am relieved, and hurl myself away from the table and jog to her nursery. Tears stream down her immaculate face and I can't help but wonder if she misses Amy. If she can feel her presence not in the room like it is supposed to be. It makes my heart break all over again. I would never have even dreamed of bringing a child into this world if it meant Amy had to die. But then I could never lose Tahlia.

As I try to soothe her with my big Daddy hands that don't seem to be doing their trick, I bustle around the kitchen, trying in vain to get the milk ready for her as she continues to cry. Her whole tiny body arches up and down in my arms, and squeals and squirms as she screams for some food. Again I know if Amy were here, this would not be nearly as hard as it is. Somehow though, I think being thrown into the deep end has allowed me to survive my first night with my daughter. I had no choice but to have a go.

Finally it is ready, and I sit us down on the couch where we sat this morning with Suse, and she guzzles hungrily away at the milk. Just a few seconds in she is already starting to nod off again, and I poke softly at her cheek to keep her awake to drink – that's something I remember Amy reading out aloud to me from one of her many books. It works too. Another quarter of the bottle goes down before the doorbell rings for the second time today. Thankfully it's open, and Jonesy enters quietly.

"Hey champ," he greets me, giving me a small smile before turning his eyes to my little girl. "How are ya?"

It's a silly question, but so much just a figure of speech that it seems normal to ask. I sigh and almost sound sarcastic. "Tired?"

He nods in understanding and sits back against the sofa cushions.

"I'm thinking about taking her to Melbourne Jonesy." There. I said it.

"Why?" he asks, stricken.

"Why not?" I answer back. "Every time I turn around I'm reminded of Amy Jonesy! Something she said, something she did. Everything in this house she picked, or we picked out together. And when I'm reminded of that it just makes me miss her even more." Is that possible?

"But you'll be taking Tay away from everything her mother loved Alex!" he leans forward again and stares me right in the eye, possessing such an earnest that I can't do anything but listen. "Won't it be bad enough that she won't have Amy to grow up with, let alone never knowing her home, her friends, her colleagues, her workplace?" He seems so defiant.

"I don't know Jonesy…I'm just trying to figure out what to do…" I shake my head sadly at him. "I don't know what to do."

"You've gotta stay Alex. Just think of when she's older, and she has a bad day and gets upset and wishes her Mum was there to comfort her. That will be the day when you and I can tell her stories about Amy, and what kind of person she was and what she would've thought. Don't keep her away from that," he pleads with me. "It's got to be the next best thing after not having Amy beside her."

"But I don't want to be in either place Jonesy!" I put my head in my hands, unable to decide. "If I stay here, I see her every time I open my eyes. If I go, I'm scared of forgetting her."

"You'll never forget her Alex," he attempts to reassure me. "I know how much you loved her. You can't forget somebody like that, no matter where you live."

I close my eyes briefly. Any option has its down points I suppose. I don't want Tay to not know everything and everyone her mother loved so much. Jonesy's right about that. We have to stay so that Tay will always know who Amy was.

Finally I open my eyes and look at him. He takes her from me and slides off the couch and onto the floor where he lays himself down on the carpet. There he places her on his chest, where she immediately curls into a ball. He smiles down at her. We have all been thrown into the deep end with Amy's death and Tay's birth, but for just a second as I watch my daughter and her godfather, I feel better about it all. "I can't wait for her to grow up. She's going to be just like Amy." He looks over at me. "She is Alex…she is."

"I know," I whisper in reply as I slide down to lay beside him and watch my daughter sleep on the man who will probably be her second Dad.

"And we'll tell her about Amy everyday, and how great she was, and how much we loved her and how much she would've loved to see you two grow up together."

All I can do is nod.

I am grateful Tay seems to be all right with just me to look after her. I considered a nanny, but immediately reconsidered when I looked at my daughter and wondered how I could ever leave her with a stranger.

My colleagues have become her aunties and uncles, and they go out of their way to make sure we're ok. It's a nice feeling to know they're there, protecting her, if not just for me, but for Amy's memory.

At night, when I do actually get to sleep, I never dream of Amy, and it disappoints me and relieves me at the same time, and upon waking up this morning, month two of being a single parent, I decide to stop putting off what I know have been two months too many for my mother. So Tay's strapped into the backseat and we're driving to Melbourne today.

"Alex!" She rushes out the front door and almost bowls me over as she embraces me. "Oh darling…" Her face begins to crumple in front of me as her familiar soft hand brushes my cheek the way it did when I was small and sought comfort from those hands.

"Mum, don't fuss. I'm fine." I take her hand and lead her to my sleeping little girl. I open the door for her and she peaks inside, enchanted and so unbelievably in love all over again.

I lift her tiny body out and hold her up to my mother the way I did at the funeral. But it makes me smile instead of cry this time. "Doesn't she look like Amy?" I ask her.

Tears come to Mum's eyes. "In every possible way," she whispers. No-one can deny how much Tay looks like Amy. She is the spitting image – the shock of dark hair, the glowing skin, the delicate features and the intense, deep eyes that no-one pulled off before Amy did.

Mum loved Amy, as I always knew she would. I remember the day I introduced these two legendary women to each other. They clicked right away. I think they would have anyway, but the Amy I met when I first came to Mt Thomas was so different to the Amy I married. So much calmer, so much better, so much more content, and it meant that Amy and my mother got on like a house on fire. And it really meant a lot to me that they got on. I wanted Mum, and Dad, to see how much I loved Amy and how much she meant to me.

I sit on the couch cradling Tay in my arms as Mum peppers me with questions. "How is she sleeping?"

"Fine." I reply, wondering why the fact that she's been sleeping the whole time I've been here isn't evidence enough of that.

"Eating?"

"Fine."

"Crying?"

"It's her special talent." I try to lighten the mood, but Mum looks stricken.

"Why, has she been crying a lot?" she asks, sitting down right beside me.

"All babies cry Mum," I remind her. "She's fine, really. Stop worrying."

She frowns, sighs and sits back against the cushions of the couch. "And how are things in general? Just you and Tahlia in the house…is it…all right?"

I shrug my shoulders at her and look down at my daughters face, cuddled in amongst the blankets. I sweep a finger across her cheek lightly. "We survive," I whisper, trying not to keep Amy in the front of my mind.

"You know you can always come here," Mum insists, looking down at Tay as well. But she doesn't succeed in convincing me. I just can't take her away from Amy's memory.

I'm trying to see things as they are

Not the way I wish that they could be

I look around the nursery as I wait for her to fall asleep. I have taken to sitting here for nearly half an hour some nights, just waiting for her to drift off, to make sure that she doesn't sleep uneasily, or dream badly. I would sleep beside her if I could. Sometimes I drift off myself, like just now, but at least she can feel my presence in the room.

I look up, feeling a presence other than my daughters in the room. A shadow stands over the bassinet, just watching as our daughter sleeps.

I remain in my chair, knowing that if I move I won't be able to see her anymore. The tears stream down my face the longer I look at her, and my heart aches in sadness. "Oh babe…" I whisper from the chair, wiping away my tears hastily with the back of my hands. She turns to me, tearing her eyes away from the bassinet for a few moments. "I miss you so much it hurts."

But for now I'll just pretend

To hold you in my arms again

For one last moment

As she fades away, drifting out of the room, I cry into my hands pathetically.

_I pull her close to me in the tiny double bed, really liking the feeling of it just being 'us' for once. We don't get much time to ourselves, and this weekend is our big opportunity. I'm not going to waste a moment._

"_Mum and Dad really like you." I smile at her as I hug her tightly to my chest._

_She blushes, but looks pleased. "I like them too," she admits quietly. "I'm so relieved…"_

"_What?" I'm confused._

"_That they like me," she answers, her cheeks still flushed with embarrassment. "I didn't think that they would. Like I wasn't the right person for you," she mumbles it, not looking at me. I shake my head at her in wonder at how little she still thinks of herself._


	7. Pieces of You

Chapter 7 Pieces of You

Chapter 7 Pieces of You

It feels odd to stay away from work for so long, but in a way it is a blessing. Going back to work would only remind me that she is no longer there, no longer a cop, no longer my colleague, no longer part of our team. She will always be my wife, but it's so hard to keep believing when she's not here anymore. I have our daughter to remind me of the beautiful person my wife was, but it's not quite the same. She's not Amy.

Three weeks before her first birthday, Tahlia begins walking. I know no better, but everyone else seems surprised. Infants don't usually walk this early. But it doesn't surprise me. She is her mother's daughter – she has her determination and drive. She tries everyday to walk a little further, and by the time her birthday rolls around she is walking unaided here, there and everywhere. It makes me smile and as our friends gather at our house this afternoon for the party she warms everybody's hearts. Even at one year old she has taken on so many of Amy's traits. Not only in her dogged determination to walk but in the way she is calm and quiet and how her soft brown hair frames her face, making her the spitting image of Amy already.

Susie and Jonesy, as my daughter's godparents, stand either side of me as I hold Tay's hands as she stands up on a chair in front of her birthday cake. We smile and laugh and encourage her to blow out the candle. We blow with her and she giggles with delight, a tiny giggle that is almost drowned out by the cheers of her guests. She has won everybody in the room over and they have showered her with gifts and kisses making her first birthday a day to remember.

But behind the scenes, as she plays with her new toys and smushes cake between her fingers with her godparents, I slip away and take a moment to sit alone in the privacy of the bedroom, away from the guests and the noise. Today is Tahlia's first birthday, but it is also the first anniversary of Amy's death. I hate that the two occasions share a day – it brings a sadness to what should be a happy day. And as if I do not see enough of Amy in our daughter anyway, but she also shares her birthday with her mother's death. How is that fair? I dread to think how I am going to explain it to her when she is older.

Never had I imagined

Living without your smile

Everyday I miss her more, and wish so feverently that she was here to see all of Tahlia's triumphs and tears. She shouldn't have had to miss out on that.

And I know you're shining down on me from heaven

Mostly though, I miss having her around. I miss telling her things, holding her close to me at night and seeing her laugh whenever we were together. Even after we were married the spark that we had since the first time we met never dimmed. I can't believe I've been without her for a whole year now. I can't believe I've actually managed to survive without her for this long.

Now it's too late to hold you

By the time Tahlia is six I have quit the police force. I went back for a while, when she was three, but that lasted for all of six months before I missed my daughter too much during the day and couldn't bear to be close to where Amy used to work any longer. I had to get out, if only to be able to keep living. Surviving.

"_Boss?" I knock on the partly open door as we approach the end of the day._

"_Come in," he mumbles, head buried in paper work, his glasses perched on his nose._

_I walk in tentatively, unsure of how to broach the subject. How do I tell him I don't want to do this job anymore? A job that is paying me perfectly well and that I am good at? Nervously, I sit down._

_I decide to get straight to the point and pull my resignation letter out of my jacket pocket and place it on the desk in front of him._

"_What's this?" he asks, raising his eyebrows at me._

"_My letter of resignation," I mumble, avoiding his eyes._

"_Resignation?" he asks, although not as shocked as I had thought he would sound._

"_Yep. I'm sorry Boss…" Suddenly it all comes spilling out. I shake my head sadly, staring at my hands. Everybody probably expects me to be over it by now. After all, it's been more than three years. "I just can't stay here anymore. It just reminds me too much of Amy…" I fade off, wanting to just get out of the office._

_He grabs my line of sight and won't let it go as he nods. "Another station…?" he suggests. _

_I shake my head. "Any station is going to do the same thing. It's this job that reminds me of her. No matter where I go, as long as I'm a cop, I'll always be reminded that she was once one too."_

_He nods slowly and sets the letter aside, not bothering to open it. "I understand Kirby." He rubs at his forehead tiredly. "If I were you I'd probably do the same."_

_All I can do is nod. I am glad he seems to understand. I suppose I should've expected that he would. God knows he's lost enough people to know how I feel. "What will you do?" he asks as I turn to leave._

_As I reach for the door handle I shrug my shoulders, my back to him. But I turn around as I speak. "I dunno," I answer honestly. I honestly hadn't thought about it. I just wanted to get out of policing. "Spend more time with Tay?"_

_As I walk out of the room I am forced to really think about what I will do. Like with my marriage, I thought it would last forever. I thought I'd always be a cop. I loved it from day one. I never expected anything to change that. Just like I never expected, even with knowing her past, that childbirth could take Amy away from me._


	8. Disorientated

Chapter 8 Disorientated

Chapter 8 Disorientated

A year after I quit the force I did move Tay and I to Melbourne. I just wanted to see how it would feel, if I could make it work there, if it would help me to not be so reminded of Amy every time I turned my head. But it didn't work. Being away from her memory, just as Jonesy had predicted all those years ago, was even worse. I just missed her more because I wasn't near her. We were only there four months, but in those four months I could see a change in Tahlia too. She wasn't happy there. I had thought that her being so young she wouldn't notice it. That she would be too young to be affected. But she could feel it, and became one very unhappy child. She would cry at night when I turned the lights off and often seemed to find her way into bed between me and the picture of Amy that sat on my bedside table.

I remember I thought you looked like an angel

Once she was asleep I would always take her back to her own bed, not wanting her to become too attached to someone she simply could never have.

Jonesy and Susie were beyond delighted when I called and told them we were returning to Mt Thomas. We even managed to buy back the house that we had left behind. It was like we had never left. Those four months in Melbourne were a mistake and soon just a memory. Tahlia turned into the child everyone seemed to remember her as, and she was soon taking dance lessons and riding a bike and becoming my closest confidante. I told her about her mother everyday, and never hid the pictures from her the way I had when we lived in Melbourne. Then I had wanted us to create a new life, away from the painful memories, but upon returning I knew that I just couldn't. I am still sure to this day that Amy's memory living right alongside us both will help us to keep going.

But I know she misses her mother. She keeps a photo of her beside her bed the way I do, and I have watched her falling asleep staring at it with droopy eyes. And everytime she reaches a milestone – a birthday, an achievement in school or dance or whatever – I wish that Amy could see it. She would take so much pleasure in watching our little girl be so happy.

Like her mother though, I know she is unhappy inside, but doesn't show it. Like Amy, she puts on a mask to shield herself, even at her young age. I knew that this would happen, because with everyday that passes she becomes more and more like Amy, and I had tried to prepare myself to deal with it. I knew that once she was old enough to realise she didn't have one half of the family unit she was supposed to that it would start to affect her. But when the time did come we couldn't avoid it, and I didn't know what to do. Luckily she is strong, like Amy, and she deals with it as best she can.

And it is only when I am with her, and she is with me that we feel closest to Amy. She slips her hand into mine even as we sit on the couch watching tv right now and I smile at her, knowing she will be ok, just like her mother always was.

There's two things I know for sure

She was sent here from heaven

And she's Daddy's little girl


	9. Mummy

Chapter 9 Mummy

Chapter 9 Mummy

I pull into Jonesy's drive way and as I pull at the handbrake I grab the umbrella from the seat beside me, ready to push it up as I step out of the car. I struggle as I get out, cursing the rain and the humidity of today.

I run up the driveway and leap onto the front verandah, letting myself inside. It is quiet, as if nobody is home, and I wonder for a second if Jonesy and I had agreed that I would pick Tay up or he would drop her home. No, I'm sure he said to come and get her. I look around and into the kitchen and down the hallway. Where are they? But as I get closer to the back verandah I hear them talking quietly to each other.

Peeking out through the fly screen of the back door I see them with their backs to me, her curled up in his arms in a big deck chair. No doubt they are trying to keep cool in this humidity and I smile as I go to push open the door to greet them.

I see her nod her head at Jonesy. "I want to know what she was really like."

He smiles and strokes her hair and for the briefest of moments I know I made the right decision in making him her godfather.

"Oh champ…" he begins, and even from here I can hear the sadness in his voice. "She really was everything your Dad says she was. Really," he tries to reassure her.

"But what was she _like_?" she whispers.

"She was the kind of copper I wanted to be like."

"Did they fall in love straight away?" the question just slips out of her mouth unconsciously and her voice sounds smaller every time she speaks.

"I reckon they did," he whispers and smiles at her. I gulp down my emotions, forcing them back down and into my belly.

She shuffles in her position in his arms and for the first time he turns his head towards the door and sees me. She doesn't notice. Instead she just curls further into his arms as if taking in what he has just told her. My heart breaks and I step out onto the verandah and Jonesy turns her over to me. She looks at me and I know she wants to cry but instead she wraps her arms around my neck. I truly hadn't thought that at seven and a half she would be thinking so deeply yet.

We sit for an hour, and I stroke her hair and Jonesy holds her hand, all in an effort to make her feel better. Eventually she falls asleep and slumped against me, I carry her back out to the car.

"Daddy?" she peaks out from under the blankets.

I turn around as I turn out her bedroom light. "Yes sweetheart?"

"Do you miss Mummy?"

It's such a simple question. Standard really, for the situation my daughter lives in. So I should've been expecting it. But I wasn't. We haven't talked about Amy for a couple of weeks now, and while it's been something of a burden off my shoulders, it also has been worrying me. I don't want Tay to always just be wondering and not asking. I want to her to be like her mother – always asking questions. And she always was, up until recently.

I don't have an answer for her, so I just blurt out the first thing that comes to me. "More than anything," I whisper it, but I know she can hear me. I sit down in the dark on her bed, stroking her hair out of her eyes. It is a deep rich dark brown, just like Amy's was, and the feeling of it gives me chills for a second as the feel of it reminds me so much of how Amy's felt.

Tay seems content with my answer and snuggles into her covers even further. I kiss her forehead, knowing that nights like this will happen again and again as she grows older and thinks more deeply about her mothers death.

I walk out of the room, tears welling in my eyes. I push down the lump in my throat all the way down the hallway until I get to the sanctuary of the bedroom I once shared with Amy.

Only then do I let out the sobs that wrack my whole body.

I've tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone

Jonesy and I have been best friends for so long that he seems to have a sixth sense with me. When the phone rings I can't even answer and it rings out. So he tries my mobile and I can't answer that either. I hide under the blankets, trying to push the memories of Amy from my mind, but having little success. I have daily reminders of her as Tahlia grows into a little girl, and when she asks about her mother it only doubles – something I don't think I can handle.

And suddenly I hear Tahlia cry out in her sleep. A little scream but one that has so much depth. A kind of depth only someone like Amy or Tahlia could possess. The sound of it sets my heart beating in fear and another feeling that is very foreign to me, even after all I've been through since Amy's death. It's a feeling of inadequacy. Of uselessness. Like even if I get up to soothe her she will still be upset. The same way I cared for my wife as best I could yet she still died. So I don't get up, and a little part of me feels like an unfit father because of it.

She keeps crying, the wails echoing throughout our little house, climbing speedily along the walls to my bedroom like spiders. The sound of her cries envelope me like a disease, reminding me constantly of how I should be sitting on her bed beside her calming her after her nightmare. But I can't move.

Minutes later, even through Tahlia's cries, I hear a key in the lock of my front door. Jonesy took it upon himself years before to get a key cut for himself that would let him into my home. I never minded. Until now. I don't want anyone else seeing how shocking I feel at this moment, even if he is my oldest and my bestest friend.

I hear him walk through the door and towards my daughter's bedroom. Only seconds later her cries subside. I hear mumblings of his voice, soothing her fears and wiping away her tears. I breathe the smallest sigh of relief. He truly is her second Dad. At that moment I feel that if I cannot share being a parent with Amy, then Jonesy is the next best choice.

I turn over in bed, hiding my face in the pillow and facing away from the door. The darkness feels like a cover that I can also hide in, away from the pressures of fatherhood and the lack of direction my life has. I think back to a night just days before Amy and I tied the knot where we laid on the grass at Govets Leap looking up at the stars and discussing our future together with an excitement I know I haven't had since. That night anything had seemed possible. We were going to do it all, or we were going to do nothing and just see where life took us – it didn't matter, we were just together and that was all we wanted. As long as we were together we were happy and it didn't matter what happened. But that was before I saw what life could throw at you. God, we were so naïve. Yet I still think back to that time and can't help but smile because I know how happy I was then.

It is this memory that pulls me out of bed, that makes me be a father to my daughter. I walk down the hallway and into her room, where she is in a ball in Jonesy's arms, her Little Mermaid sheets in a skew around her, messy and tangled. There is only a thin sliver of light that is illuminating the room, but it is enough to show me what breaks my heart.

I walk up to the end of the bed, and climb onto it, crawling my way to the pillow where Tay and Evan sit. As soon as she sees me she reaches for me, and it is a brief moment where I feel that I would be lost without her, as she would with me, no matter how terrible a parent I am. She desperately clings to me, her arms around my neck, her face in my chest, her hair falling in her eyes.

My daughter doesn't say anything, and neither does Jonesy as he exits the room. I pay no attention to him, devoting every ounce of myself to Tay, like I know I should.

I whisper in her ear. "There won't be a day that you live when I won't tell you something about your Mum." She exhales, then gulps in more night air, trying to fight her tears. "You will always know every little thing about her." I know Amy would want me to tell it all.

I can feel her nodding against me and her tense little body relaxing. She breathes more evenly as we continue to sit against the headboard of her bed, in each others arms for what I hope will be forever.

In my heart a place  
A most special place  
And it's all for you  
You're my girl, you're my angel


	10. Perfect

Chapter 10 Perfect

Chapter 10 Perfect

When Tahlia is asleep, I let my thoughts drift yet again to when Amy was alive. Some memories take my breath away, and some make it hard for me to wipe the smile from my face. Like the time I took her out for dinner. It was our first 'proper' date.

_I cannot believe how long I have spent choosing a tie. I haven't done this since the year 11 formal when I wanted to impress Annie Sullivan so much that I spent a whole weeks pay packet from my milk run on a new tie from Myer. I stood there for hours that afternoon, unable to decide which one looked the best and would catch her eye the most._

_This one will have to do. I don't have anymore time to stand in front of the mirror now. She'll be waiting. And I want to make a good impression. I know women like to be swept off their feet. So I cannot be late. I have to make up for that ridiculous remark I made the first day I met Amy. And God knows it has taken this long to get her to go out with me that I just cannot screw it all up now. It has to be perfect or else I'll lose my chance._

_I skip over the puddles of water in the driveway as I head to my car. It's beginning to rain but I hardly notice it. I am so excited to have this event happen at last that not even bad weather could ruin it. I hop into the drivers seat and before I turn on the ignition I lean over to look through the cd's in my glove box. What will impress her? Will she think I'm a total bogan if I have Paul Kelly playing as we drive to the restaurant? Or would John Farnham be a better choice? I don't think I have anything to her tastes. Not that I know what her tastes are. I can only assume. That's what makes me look forward so much to tonight – I want to learn everything about her she has never surrendered to me at the office before. What she has never surrendered to anyone._

_I settle with Paul Kelly and his smooth songs that always relax me and make me smile. Hopefully they will Amy too, if she is half as nervous as I am. I cruise the streets, tapping the steering wheel with my fingers to the beat of To Her Door but when I reach the station I need to turn off the music to stop myself going crazy. The moment has come._

_I pull off my seatbelt and turn off the headlights. Getting out of the car I notice the drizzle is still there, falling from the heavens onto my special night. I put my hands in my pockets and walk towards the back entrance of the station, anticipating how Amy will look tonight. Nothing short of beautiful I am sure. _

_She insisted I pick her up here, saying she had a tonne of work to do before we went out. I was disappointed that she didn't seem very eager – didn't sound like she was going to stand in front of the mirror for half an hour wondering what to wear like I just did – but something about the way she spoke reassured me she was still up for us going out._

_As I near the door it opens and she walks out, draped in her heavy purple coat – my favourite coat in her collection. She is holding her briefcase in one hand and brushing her hair out of her eyes with the other, ruffled out of place by the wintry, blustery evening. I look at her with a smile. She could do just about anything and it would still make my heart skip a beat. _

_I am lost for words for an awkward, brief second. All I can manage is a meager greeting usually reserved for someone like Jonesy after we have had a night on the tiles. "Hey," I greet her, groaning inwardly at how stupid I sound. She looks up and meets my eyes and I catch a flicker of a smile._

_When you look at me_

_I can touch the sky_

"_Hi," she replies, walking hesitantly towards me. When she reaches me I turn around and together we head back to my car. We don't say anything. I am lost for words and it seems so is she. This feels like my first date with Annie Sullivan – a date that was a disaster from beginning to end. And the tie sucked as well._

_But suddenly she slips. The heel of her shoe hits a gravel stone and she pitches forward, her foot immersed in a pot hole of dirty dark water. I catch her by the elbow, but it's not enough, especially in the dark. My hands slip around her rib cage as she slips until I finally get ahold of her securely under the armpits. My brain cries, because she hasn't made a sound, even in pain, and I know that this isn't on purpose. She has programmed herself to not show any emotions. I know her background. I know what happened to her. I feel such pity at how she has had to grow up like this, never crying out in pain or unfairness, but I say nothing because I know she wouldn't want me to._

_She straightens up and I let go of her, eyeing her damp shoe. She smooths out her jacket and continues walking, avoiding my eyes. I look up into the rain – is the whole night going to be as awkward and uncomfortable as that just was?_

_I snap back to reality and decide to throw caution to the wind. If she can move on from it so can I. I rush to the passenger side of my car and open the door for her. Again I get a flicker of a smile – anyone else would take it as a half hearted effort and get pissed off, but I am grateful for whatever she gives me. Anything to break the tension between us._

_We drive in relative silence all the way to the restaurant – a cosy Italian place I have always loved. She doesn't even make small talk the way she does when we're in the patrol car together during the day. I guess now she doesn't have instructions to give me or reprimands to hand out. She's not above me now. We're just two people going on a date. Maybe it scares the life out of her._

_When we get to the restaurant I act the gentleman again, sure it will impress her. I open her door for her and then the door to the restaurant. She smiles a more assured smile at me as she stands beside me as we wait to be directed to our table. When we get there she shrugs off her coat and I half dart to help her with it – more gentlemanly acts – but she is too quick and has it off herself and hung over the back of her chair before I can move. A second later I am glad I didn't move, because then I couldn't have appreciated the view of her I get from standing directly opposite her. When I saw her in her coat at the station before I assumed she was just wearing her standard things, what she always wears to work. But under that coat she was hiding the most ornate ivory blouse, detailed with beads and lace. It is tucked in so neatly to her linen pants and I almost gasp at how beautiful she looks. I never thought Amy Fox could look like a fashion model._

_We sit down and for the first time speak to each other. "This place looks fantastic Alex," she surrenders. I can't make up my mind whether she really means or she is just saying it to be polite. "Have you been here before?"_

_It makes me relax though, whether she is being polite or not. I rest my elbows on the table and lean forward nodding and smiling. "A few times," I reveal. "They serve the nicest carbonara." She raises her eyebrows as if to say 'oh yeah?' and picks up the menu._

_A few minutes later a waiter approaches and I watch as Amy shivers, a smile on her lips and a glow in her cheeks, as the waiter asks if 'we' are ready. My heart leaps out of my chest. We both order the carbonara and some wine and are soon left alone again. The restaurant is only half full, meaning we can't let ourselves be enveloped or hidden by the presence of others. It is now or never._

_Amy seems reluctant to talk about work, something that surprises me. She asks a few questions about me, then about Jonesy. It strikes me how much her and I are the same with our friendships – no one really outside the police force is apart of our friendship circles. For me I think it is because those in the force are all I ever needed. For her I think it is because that's all she feels she can get._

_When our meals arrive the pasta steams into our faces as it sits before us. I pour her a glass of wine and then one for myself and she picks up her fork as I pick up my glass. My movement catches her eye and she quickly picks up her glass to, although seeming reluctant to toast anything. We don't clink glasses – what is there to toast? – just tip them towards each other with a nod of our heads and a small smile, as if we are restaurant critics, ready to dig in and make a judgement on our food. She takes a delicate sip of her wine, treating it as I am sure she treats everything – with caution, because she has allowed herself so little time to experience such luxuries and is therefore weary of it._

_She digs into her pasta with a little more gusto though but after a few bites is unbelievably embarrassed when a splash of cream sauce ends up on her delicate blouse. She seems so upset, and not just because she has ruined the look of her clothes, dabbing at it with her cloth napkin in desperation. I want to lift up her chin with my finger and tell her not to worry about it, but I don't. I don't feel like we have passed the mark yet where I can go so far as to touch her in that way. I already went too far when I caught her when she slipped earlier._

_I know she's not perfect_

_But she tries so hard for me_

_Later I drop her back at the station where she has left her car. I swing into a car space not far from hers, and she undoes her seatbelt as I reach over to the backseat and grab her briefcase for her. When I come back she is looking at me with a look I cannot describe. "This was really nice Alex," she says. I can feel something bad coming. "But I don't think it's going to work."_

_I admit defeat quicker than I had planned to in my head. "I tried to make everything so perfect," I admit, and she smiles, thankful for my efforts._

"_I tried to __**be**__ perfect," she says. She shrugs her shoulders, looking out towards her car. _

_In my dreams_

_You were perfect_

"_You don't need to be perfect Amy," I insist, but she has already given up and is reaching for the door handle. She gets out and before she closes the door she leans in and smiles sadly at me. "Thanks," she says quietly before she heads back to her car. I watch her walk away from me, her head down walking with a kind of disappointment but a strength at the same time._

_This wasn't what I had planned it to be like in my head. I head home, disappointed beyond belief. She thought she had to be everything I wanted, when in fact all I wanted was for her to be herself._

_Don't change a thing_

_Cos you're perfect_

_The next day I head to work with a heavy heart, knowing more awkwardness is sure to follow between Amy and I. And it does. I tiptoe around her all morning, not knowing what to say. She does the same with me, but she is better at avoiding what she doesn't want to deal with – better than I – and she stays almost out of sight until lunchtime. It is by then that I have had enough and decide to bite the bullet, not willing to let what chance I had slip away so easily._

_I corner her in the mess room when she is making her coffee. She is unaware I am in the room until I am right behind her, not allowing her to escape. I plonk a coffee mug down beside hers as she pours water from the kettle and she jumps a little when she realises I am right beside her. But to her credit she doesn't miss another beat and dutifully fills my mug with the boiling liquid. She smiles uneasily as she puts the jug back into it's holder, but I can tell she is holding her breath in anticipation._

"_Let me take you out again tonight Amy," I insist. She looks at me with sorrowful eyes. "It'll be different, I promise."_

_She is hesitating. I look at her more earnestly, making her connect gazes with me. "Please?" I ask, trying not to sound desperate._

_She grabs her coffee mug and heads for the door. I look after her, still waiting for an answer. When she gets to the door she turns back fleetingly. "Ok," she answers. I grin._

_It gets to the end of the day and it suddenly occurs to me that I have nothing planned to make this date with Amy be so different from the last one. It will be different on the surface, because a policemens wage does not allow for two restaurant meals in one week, so I must think of something else. I decide on some cheap take away and tell her to be at my place at seven. She agrees and I get that flutter again. This time I have to make it work._

_When she arrives at seven on the nose, I have just finished straightening up the place and shooing Jonesy out the door. This time I am prepared. I welcome her in and she seems pleased to be here – as if appreciative of my effort and all of my insistences. But as we sit at the kitchen table with our curries, I still feel like a wall sits between us. I don't know for the life of me what I can do to break it down and make everything feel comfortable and less awkward._

_The bottle of red we are consuming helps a little – not much, but a little – and it at least makes Amy seem a little more at ease. Perhaps she thinks like I do, that this time it is time to go for broke. I drink more than I expect to, and so does she, but we still have our bearings. We end up on the couch some time later, flicking through the channels as if by last resort desperation to pad out time so this isn't the shortest dinner date ever. She sits in the armchair to my left as I sit on the two seater, but soon comes to sit beside me, almost unaware that she has done so, as she looks through the tv guide to see what shows are on as I channel surf._

_With her beside me I can smell the wine on her breath and the spicy aroma of the food on her skin. It clings to her like a silk sheet, thin and transparent, but still a disguise of sorts. When she leans over to put the program back on the coffee table I catch her lips in a kiss. It's me taking the plunge, and to my surprise she reacts back better than I had anticipated. Her alcoholic breath mingles with mine and I grip one of her hands that sits in her lap, not knowing what to do with itself. _

_To only strike me once_

_Would still be perfect_

_She is so forward, I am surprised. But it feels put on. Not real. I pull away from her. She looks at me surprised, and blushes a light pink as we stare at each other for a few moments. It's not the alcohol. It's something else that's making her so brave. I question her. "Are you trying to be perfect again?" I almost sound accusing._

_She doesn't have an answer, but I know she is screaming yes inside her head. She whole body seems to give a quiver, like someone has walked over her grave, and she gets up and hastily gathers her belongings. Never one to show too much of a broken composure, she doesn't run for the door, but she still walks pretty god damn fast out of the house. I look after her, but don't stop her. _

_Even when you run_

_You're still worth it_

_I sit and listen as she starts her car and reverses out of the driveway. I just didn't want to make her feel like I was controlling her – the way she has probably felt her whole life. What was so wrong with me not wanting her to feel like that? I thought I was protecting her, so I pushed her away, determined to not let her regret what she was about to do._

_I flop back onto the couch and lie on it staring at the ceiling. Maybe it's not meant to be._

_Love, as scarring as it is_

_Tell me is it real_

_If it ain't hurtin'_


	11. Touch

Chapter 11 Touch

_Chapter 11 Touch_

_The next night I sit on the couch alone, half watching a soapie. A burger is beside me and a beer on the coffee table. Jonesy is on night shift so the place is uncomfortably quiet. I feel restless._

_Ding dong_

_I arch my head back over the back of the couch to look at the front door, wondering who could possibly be coming to visit me. Sighing I hurl myself up to standing and head to the door. One hand on the door handle and the other running roughly through my hair I open it and am shocked by what I see. It's Amy. She stands uselessly and uncomfortably in front of me, staring at the ground._

"_I'm sorry about last night," she whispers so quietly that I have to lean forward to hear her. "Can I come in?" She finally looks up at me as she asks._

_I nod, not knowing what to say. I step back and allow her to step inside. She has an unbreakable sense of nervousness surrounding her – I can tell so easily now after two failed attempts at trying to break it – and she turns back to me wanting to say something, explain herself more perhaps, but nothing comes out. So I blurt out something I'm unsure I should say instead._

"_We're so different you and me," I mumble, my hands in my pockets and my eyes staring at the floor, mimicking how Amy stood at my front door just moments before. "But I think that's what attracts me to you."_

_She looks at me. "Really?"_

_I feel so untouched_

"_Really," I answer. I take a step towards her and reach out and touch the hair that hangs by her ear. She draws in a sharp breath, but doesn't pull away. I look at her and notice she is still staring at the ground, but a second later she connects gazes with me and takes a step closer to me._

_When I hear you breathe_

_We lay facing each other in my bed, something huge seemingly wedging a gap between us. I feel nervous. So does she. A terrified look occupies her face, and I don't know if it is what is keeping her from running away, or if it is making her face her fears once and for all. We must have lain here for half an hour now, still fully clothed, as if waiting for something to happen, or something to tear us away from this extraordinary situation._

_Finally I can't take it anymore and I shuffle closer to her. I feel like it is my responsibility to show her what love can be. How it can be so different to what she has experienced in the past. She draws in another sharp breath, but doesn't move away. Her body is still tense though and it doesn't unclench until I touch her in the darkness. I reach for her cheek, feeling a flurry within me as I touch the soft skin there, and I slowly move my hand down so it caresses her jaw line, then her neck. She draws in yet another breath as I stroke her collarbone, then just above her breast. She feels incredible, unlike any woman I've ever touched before. She doesn't stop me when I move further down her body, despite the fact I am plagued by an irrational fear that she feels like she must just lie here and take this, let me do whatever I want. If it is going to be like that then I don't want to go any further. I don't want to make her feel worthless. _

_So it's lucky that she reaches for me a moment later, quashing my fears. Her hand shakes, unsure of where to touch, before finally settling on my chest. It kind of hovers there, unsure of where to go next. I let her feel her own way, not forcing her to do anything she doesn't want to._

_Reach out and touch_

_My hand caresses her cheek again and I lean over and place a kiss in the small area just under her ear. Again to my surprise she responds with more eagerness than I thought she would. She leans into my kiss, as if begging for more. I smile to myself and leave a trail of tiny warm smudges down her neck and onto her chest. She trembles and moves in closer to me so that our bodies are just centimeters apart. A hand loops around to the back of my neck and she clings to me in a way I didn't think Amy Fox was capable of. I feel her hair fall onto my shoulder as the centimeters between us dissolve and, her body up against mine, I feel her breathe out at last._

_You've set my heart on fire_

_I feel so elated that she is relaxed this way. I stop placing kisses on her skin, having touched every exposed spot available now anyway, and just revel for a moment in being so close to her. She breathes a warm tingly breath onto my body as she lies cocooned against me. She gradually pulls her head out of my hold and our lips meet in another kiss, hungrier this time, so desperate for each other. _

_Feel her body rise_

_When you kiss her mouth_

_We get so caught up in the kiss that it seems to last minutes, not seconds, and as we taste each other we get so much heat between us that we sit up and shuffle onto our knees, facing one another. I continue to push my lips into hers, and hold her to me, my hands caressing her back, but a second later I let go and undo the buttons of my shirt and peel it off my shoulders. She stares, transfixed, her delicate features hidden in the darkness from everything but my eyes. _

_I don't know how confident of herself she is, so I take her jacket off for her, placing it on the bed beside us. Even without the jacket she feels so much more real, and I help her to peel off the next layer. She kneels before me, almost nothing covering her, and I appreciate everything my eyes are showing me. I run a hand down her shoulder, over the bra strap right down to her fingertips. When I get there she laces her fingers immediately through mine, connecting us forever. She smiles and I kiss her again and we ease back down to lay facing each other again, me not on top of her to make her feel like she is being used, and her not on top of me to face her fear of intimacy. We are equal somehow this way, lying facing each other._

_Don't even think about the consequence_

_I cup her face in my hands and can't help but kiss it again and again. Everything remains slow and rhythmic, quiet and peaceful, and I know this is the way Amy wants it to be. Nothing too over the top, nothing too frightening. A slow pace to allow time to appreciate every single movement and bask in the feeling it creates._

_It takes hours before all our clothes are off, but the feeling is too good to rush things. I forgot the time long ago. We are too consumed in each other. I feel like I am able to suck in her essence – she is that close to me. My hands explore so adoringly…every curve of every body part, every smooth plain of skin. Our legs intertwine and she seems to fit so well into every curve and crevice that I have._

_We move with such a gentle rhythm, but still, sweat forms on our brows, all over us so quickly, as we come together with such ease at last. It is a feeling I cannot comprehend at that moment, and don't think I will ever be able to. She surrenders to me, and I treat her like a porcelain doll in return – beauty at every angle, a light touch the only way to feel. She sags at times under my touch, I imagine releasing everything she has ever held in, away from the world, and I hope that my kisses reassure her that to be this way is ok._

_You've still got me to hold you up, up_

_I won't ever let you down_

_I admit, as we lie together, my mind races too far ahead of itself, imagining, just for milliseconds, what life will be like after this encounter. But it doesn't deter me, it only encourages me to whisper that I love her in her ear. Her hair, sticky and damp from our actions, is plastered to her forehead, shielding her eyes from my gaze. She brushes it out of the way with one fell swoop and smiles in a way I have never seen her smile before. She reaches up to kiss me again._

_Something happened for the very first time with you_


	12. Suddenly

Chapter 12 Suddenly

_Chapter 12 Suddenly_

_It is so early. I open my eyes to see Amy still wrapped around me, holding on for dear life. I breathe out, falling into a little reverie of happiness over what happened between us last night. I never thought she would let me get that close to her. As I think back to those hours we spent together last night she stirs in my arms, looking like a child waking from a long slumber. She pulls back in amongst the sheets and rubs at her eyes. She turns her head from side to side slowly, waking herself up properly and when she sees me for the briefest of seconds I know she is startled. It's written all over her face._

_When I woke up_

_You were perfect_

_She doesn't have anything to say, and surprisingly neither do I. I thought that this would've broken down that damn wall, but maybe we've only half knocked it down. She smiles nervously and slithers to the edge of the bed, away from me. Keeping the sheet secured across her body with one strong hand, she reaches for her clothes with the other. They are scattered on the floor but she stealthily reaches them and in a heartbeat they are back on, shielding her beauty from my view. Fully dressed, she sits with her back to me for several seconds before getting up and heading for the door. When she reaches it she turns back and gives a tiny smile that leaves me feeling horribly confused. _

_I'm not sorry _

_For what we did_

_For who we were_

_After she leaves I lie in bed turning everything over in my head. This…whatever it is we have, whatever I should call it, has gone so fast. Perhaps it was naïve of me to think that she would turn into this loving, upfront, relaxed person. I know she isn't that, but I also didn't expect the morning after the night before to be as much of a let down as that just was._

I tuck her back into bed, pulling the covers up close by her neck, and then walk out of the room as quietly as I can. As I go to close the door I take one last look at my daughter, snuggled into her own little dream world. My mind races back for a brief moment to when I bought this bed. All around me in the store there seemed to be nothing but trundle and bunk beds and they made me want to run from the store right back into my car and all the way home again. Because I would never need to buy a trundle bed or a bunk bed, because I would never have anymore children. And that thought alone saddened me more than I can accurately express. Half of me was mad at myself for thinking selfishly of my own desire for a big family and the other half of me cried inside because I would never ever get that chance to have that family, because I would never want to share something so incredible with anyone but Amy. And to think we had been so close once before, before Tay, and it was shunted away…I've just never felt so powerless and incapable in my life.

_The next few days are awkward and uncomfortable, but we get along as we always have. She's still shy, but extends herself so much more now than she used to, as if she has scaled a wall and set foot on the bright side of life – the side she has never known before. Inside I secretly feel glad I was able to make that happen._

_It is some weeks later, almost two months later in fact, that I stop on my way out one day, realizing how little of Amy I have seen lately. I hadn't necessarily thought that we would start spending every single day together after that night, but I realise only now that we've been spending even less time together than we did before. I stop and go to turn back to maybe knock quietly on Amy's office door, poke my head in and just say hello, but Jonesy intercepts me and lays the guilt on thickly. "You haven't been to the pub in weeks Alex!" he complains, and I feel guilty enough at neglecting my best friend that I agree to go have a beer._

_  
As it always does with Jonesy, one turns into five and we both lose track of time and we eventually stumble home, knowing somewhere – god knows exactly where, but somewhere – in the backs of our minds that we do have to work tomorrow. I fall into bed a little before 2am and sleep without dreams. Saturday is gone._


End file.
